


Negatives and Positives

by foolyoulove



Series: Domestic Bliss and Detours [3]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Avengers Movies Universe
Genre: (but that's pretty fleeting), Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Arguing, Car Accidents, Emotional Constipation, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Miscarriage, Moving On, Pregnancy, Reconciliation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-13
Updated: 2012-08-13
Packaged: 2017-11-12 00:52:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/484796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foolyoulove/pseuds/foolyoulove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Direct sequel to "<a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/455165/chapters/782040">Perfect Little Plus-Sign</a>."  Pepper and Tony are starting to get the hang of the whole pregnancy thing in their own ways.  But, after an accident suddenly turns everything around, it takes some time for them to figure out that the best way for them to move forward is together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A darker installment in the series--please check the tags for a couple potentially triggering topics, and know that you can entirely skip this story without sacrificing understanding or enjoyment of the rest of the series. We're back to our regularly scheduled fluff in [Part 4](http://archiveofourown.org/works/483233/chapters/841043). :)
> 
> As usual, the characters aren't mine, no profit or personal gain intended, but your comments are food for this fanfic author's soul.

~ ~ ~ ~

Pregnancy was not entirely kind to Pepper Potts, emotionally or physically. The anxieties that she figured any expectant mother could experience were compounded by the fact that she was bearing an heir to one of the country's--if not the world's--most recognizable people, who had made enemies ranging from intergalactic evil empires to terrorist cells to the occasional woman who still thought that one-night stand over a decade ago _meant something_. Tony was really doing an admirable job of trying not to aggravate her, and her de facto guardians generally avoided treating her any differently than normal, but she was still always on edge. Her stress levels didn't really help the nausea that started early in her pregnancy and continued to happen often, which had presented a particular challenge to discretion around the office. Or, maybe she was on edge because she was vomiting so often, but that was a "chicken or egg" problem that she chose not to dwell on. At least she had a private executive bathroom (having learned to read some subtle cues that would give herself time to make it there as opposed to losing it in the wastebasket at her desk) and Tony and Happy floating around Stark Industries to help her with concealment and cover stories for now. She was starting to have real difficulty fitting into her favored pencil skirts and tailored blouses, though, and well-chosen suit jackets would only camouflage the baby bump for so much longer. 

Still, she and Tony still didn't have a real plan to deal with the additional publicity that would come once the world caught wind of her pregnancy. Tony acted unperturbed by the inevitable flood of attention ( _"Don't sweat it, the world will be thrilled for us!"_ ), but though he could be cocky, he wasn't naïve about what the wrong parties could do with that knowledge. A more realistic concern, she hoped, was the potential "Iron Baby" or "Earth's Tiniest Heroes" headlines that Tony thought would be hilarious but made her stomach churn--a sensation she was eager to avoid given the volume of recent memories featuring her face over the toilet. 

There was also the matter of how she would raise a baby and run a multi-national, multi-billion-dollar company at the same time. Pepper planned to work from home as much as possible, but couldn't shake the nagging feeling that she'd be shorting both the company and the baby that way; she resigned herself to hiring a nanny to back her up despite how much it offended the sensibilities of her own modest upbringing. Tony talked a big game about how involved he wanted to be, but the fact of the matter was that Iron Man could be called in at any time, so Tony couldn't really guarantee that he'd be around, ever. As she finished brushing her teeth one morning in week fourteen, it dawned on Pepper that she was basically preparing herself to be a single working mother--in a strictly metaphorical sense, she hoped. Then she realized with a start that despite her current train of thought she didn't feel nauseous at all, and really had a taste for waffles with fresh blueberries. She walked back into the bedroom, where Tony was still asleep, and scratched through his hair as she sat down on the bed.

"Good morning."

He huffed in response, then muttered something mostly incoherent but probably vaguely insulting.

"Time to get up, Tony. I'm hungry."

"Am I still sleeping?" he mumbled into the pillow.

"Nope." She described her waffle urge to him in great detail.

He rolled over onto his back and threw an arm across her lap. "So, you actually feel like eating?" He blinked the sleep out of his features. "Yes, Virginia, there _is_ a Santa Claus."

"Are you ever going to get tired of that joke? Because I did around age seven."

"Nope. You feel like the real thing? I could fly to Belgium, but you'd probably be pretty hungry by the time I got home."

She smiled sweetly. "I feel like... if I don't have a plate in front of me in about half an hour, I might start throwing punches." Apparently, whatever group of neurons controlled her appetite, which had been dialed into 'none' for the past several weeks, passed through 'normal' and went straight to 'ravenous cravings.' Fortunately for Tony's face, there were two pints of blueberries in the fridge--and although he wasn't the most accomplished chef, he could at least manage respectable waffles, since those were mostly basic chemistry anyway. If he thought of any jokes about 'eating for two' as she contemplated having a third plate, he wisely kept them to himself.

~ ~ ~ ~

They were still basking in Pepper's newly-returned ability to keep meals down three days later as they prepared for a day of meetings in Paris. She had a terrible time convincing Tony that she should come on the trip at all, since he seemed to be under the impression that trans-oceanic flight caused pregnant women to spontaneously combust. They compromised on hiring a physician to ride along on the flight; Pepper was frankly surprised that Tony hadn't tried to have her tailed by a medical professional at all times (at least, not that she knew of) as he told the doctor to take a personal day in Paris on his tab.

They'd flown into Beauvais-Tillé and stayed overnight about an hour outside of Paris rather than Tony's well-appointed but lately little-used penthouse in town in an effort to avoid the potential attention of the dense city. As Pepper finished coiffing herself in the morning (slipping on a horrifyingly sensible pair of two-and-a-half-inch pumps since her feet were starting to swell a little too much for any of her sky-high Louboutins--which Tony had miraculously refrained from commenting on so far), she found him still dressed down and manically rendering a... _something_ on a tablet. Shaking her head, she walked up beside him and squeezed his shoulder. "Happy will be waiting out front in twenty minutes."  

"Twenty minutes?" He sounded puzzled.

"Tony. Meeting. Important meeting. Like, 'the reason we're in France,' meeting. What you should be preparing for right now instead of doodling."

"Doodling!" He dramatically clutched a hand over his heart. "You wound me. I'm innovating here."   

"You can innovate on the plane home tonight, Mr. Stark." She ruffled his hair. "Time to go get dressed."  

"Ah, I've just been 'Mr. Stark'-ed. I do believe that means I'm being wrangled." He finally tore his eyes away from the tablet to put his hands on either side of Pepper's waist. He planted a kiss on the slight swell of her abdomen before speaking with mock solemnity: "I promise I will never stifle your creativity." 

She swatted at him and told him he could have five more minutes, which meant that thirty-three minutes later ("You can't interrupt _innovation_ , Pepper!") they were approaching Happy's waiting car. Tony motioned for her to climb in first, but she stopped short while rifling through her bag. "I think I left my phone behind." 

With a smirk, Tony pulled it out of the pocket of his own suit jacket. "You almost did. Luckily, you've got me watching your back."

She grabbed the phone from his hand. "Oh, don't be so... you. You couldn't have just handed it to me when you found it? Get in the car."

"Hey, I can't watch your back if I get in first. It would be a crime to waste the opportunity." Tony wagged his eyebrows at her, which earned him an exaggerated sigh and annoyed shove toward the car door. Once she'd climbed in behind him and the door was closed, Tony reached around her and grabbed a seatbelt to fasten across her torso. "Safety first, Potts." He winked, and kissed her cheek.

They embarked on a terribly dull car ride, poring over the notes and financial reports spanning the space between them on the wide bench seat (yes, of course, tablets were nice, but sometimes Pepper just preferred her spreadsheets on paper), which commanded their attention over the passing French scenery. Suddenly, Happy yelled out a curse from the driver's seat. 

There wasn't enough time for any of them to fully react to the box truck that was barreling toward the passenger side of the car.

Pepper barely managed to throw an arm up over her face before the impact that threw her against her seatbelt and sent the car skidding to a stop. She blinked her eyes forcefully, trying to make sense of the mess of metal and broken glass around her.

After a few seconds of stunned silence, Tony was apparently regaining his wits. "What the _fuck_ , Hogan?"

"Dammit, he just barreled into the intersection, Boss. The curve was blind, I didn't see him coming until it was too late. Are you guys okay back there?"

Tony had slid across the seat towards her while Happy was still answering. "Pepper?"   

Her head was buzzing. She tried to reach around her side to unlatch her seatbelt, and she grunted when she couldn't seem to make her right arm cooperate. She felt Tony's hand on her other shoulder.   "Whoa, easy. What's up?"   

She tried to focus on Tony next to her. She couldn't keep her eyes still, but managed to make out a cut on the side of his face. "You're bleeding."  

"It's nothing. Are you okay?"  

"Spinning. Why is the car..." She closed her eyes and trailed off into a moan as her head fell back against the headrest.  

"Pepper? We're not moving. You probably hit your head. You're okay, you're just a little dizzy." He sounded like he was trying to convince himself as much as her. "Happy! Go find some help for her. And see if you can figure out what the hell happened. I'm not leaving unless we need the suit."

"You got it." Pepper heard the door open and felt the car shift slightly as Happy climbed out.

"Tony...?" she whimpered, fingers scrabbling for his.

He took her hand. "Hey, I'm right here."

"Hurts," she choked out.  

"What hurts?"  

"Everything." The initial shock and adrenaline were starting to wear off. Suddenly, she felt a horrible spasm; she hunched over, but the sudden motion caused a sharp pain in her ribs and seemed to send the world spinning faster. She cried out and clenched her eyes tighter shut.  

"Jesus! Hang on, Pepper." He leaned over her to yell out the broken window, apparently at bystanders. "Hey. Hey! _Il y a une femme enceinte ici! Nous avons besoin d'un ambulance! Rapidement!_ "

"What...?" She was having a hard enough time formulating thoughts in English at the moment, let alone a foreign language.

"Just further sounding the alarm. Happy's French isn't the greatest."

"But... someone might recognize... " She eased herself back upright with a hiss through gritted teeth.  

"I don't care right now. I want you out of here faster."  Tony stroked her hair and tried to convince her to sit still until the paramedics arrived, yet she couldn't seem to stop herself from writhing around in a futile attempt to find a comfortable position. 

Pepper anchored herself to the firm grip of his other hand, but found herself slipping rapidly. "Tired."  

"Well, you're not allowed to fall asleep, Pepper. Not okay."

"Sleep soon, though?"

"Soon, yeah, at the hospital. Not right now." Her head started to loll; he released her hand so he could support her head from both sides. "Pepper? Hey. Look at me." The vast majority of her brain was signaling that consciousness was the worst idea in the world, but since it seemed important to Tony, she kept working for it, forcing her eyes open to find his face swimming near hers. "Stay awake or you're fired. I mean it, Potts."

"Can't fire...who'd tie your shoes?" She blinked, unfocused, trying to steady her jittering eyes. 

A look of relief passed over his face. "I knew you were still with me, here. I don't make it a week without you, right? I... _we_ need you."

She thought she could hear sirens approaching, finally, but her thoughts were rapidly losing coherence and her vision was darkening. "Mm... where'd the sun go?" she slurred.

He gently clapped his hand against her cheek. "Nonono, Pepper. Come on, don't do this. Pepper!" 

Her eyes slipped shut as she lost her fight for consciousness despite Tony's frantic pleas.  

~ ~ ~ ~


	2. Chapter 2

~ ~ ~ ~ 

There was daylight coming in the window when Pepper woke up in a hospital bed, groggy, with no idea if minutes, hours, or days had passed. She looked around, trying to assess her situation. Her right arm was in a sling; her left hand had an IV. She could move fingers and toes, but her right foot was slightly elevated, presumably in a cast. She lifted her head slightly and brought her eyes to focus on Tony, hunched awkwardly in a chair, dozing with his cheek resting on her left thigh. She shook her leg slightly to rouse him. "Tony?"

"Eh?" He blinked a couple times and then sat up with a jolt. "Pepper? Hi." His relief was palpable.

"I think you were drooling on my leg."

"Oh, sorry." He wiped at her futilely with his hand.

"What happened?"

"Car accident."

"I don't remember coming here." She got a clearer look at his face--the stubble suggested that a day had passed.

"Well, you're gonna be fine, but you got your bell rung, and..." he trailed off on something that sounded suspiciously like 'blood loss.' He then became very interested in scratching the back of his neck and looking out the window; she suddenly felt very uncomfortable and tried to sit up. "Whoa whoa whoa, no sitting yet." Tony was standing with his hands on her shoulders, stilling her--too late, though, and she whimpered as she felt pain in her ribs and the room started to spin, triggering memories of twisted metal and broken glass. After he got her settled back on her pillow, Tony sat down on the side of the bed and squeezed her fingers, being ginger about her IV.

"Seriously, what happened?"  

He was picking at her blanket with his other hand. "A delivery truck driver had a seizure behind the wheel and broadsided us. Happy checked it out, ready to use his fists to defend you and/or throw me the suitcase, but it seemed legit. I guess the bastard will be okay. Happy's fine too, by the way, other than a few stitches and a sprained wrist. I went ahead and sent him home on the jet since you can't fly for a little while. He wanted me to tell you 'hi' when you woke up."  He spoke quickly, sounding like he was forcing himself to sound casual.

"Tony... the baby?" He fidgeted his thumb across her knuckles. "Tony, look at me." When she finally got a good look at his eyes--eyes that even around her, he still liked to pretend never shed tears--she realized that they were red. He bit one side of his lip and shook his head, just once. "Oh." She didn't feel horror, or heartache, or even disappointment--she didn't feel much of anything, actually. "How? And what else is wrong with me?"

"Do you really want the laundry list right now?"

"Yes."

He sighed, then rattled off her injuries with the ease of someone who'd been dwelling on them for several hours. "Placental abruption, with hemorrhage. Plus a concussion, dislocated shoulder, broken ankle, two broken ribs and three more cracked, and several dozen stitches." He clenched his jaw and shook his head. "All I needed was ten stitches and some Tylenol. This isn't fair, Pepper. How the hell does everyone else walk away from this, and you--"

"Tony, it's okay. You just said I'll be fine."

"Dammit, Pepper! This is not okay!" He took a deep breath with closed eyes and exhaled heavily, calming himself. "I'm just... I thought I was watching you die and I couldn't do shit to stop it. The suit, or money, or--or snark were of absolutely no use, and worst of all, you couldn't to tell me the right thing to do." He scrubbed his face with his free hand and laughed, humorlessly, shaking his head. "And this was just another goddamned car wreck."

She hadn't considered the connection to how he had lost his parents. "Tony--"  

"If I'd been ready to go on time, or if I had insisted that you to get in the car first, or if I'd reviewed the notes ahead of time like you told me to instead of waiting until the car ride I would have seen what was happening and I could have thrown myself over--and why were we in an unmodified car anyway--"  

"Tony, stop it." Pepper had no tolerance for self-flagellation at the moment. Tony stared at the floor and she at the ceiling in silence for a while. She sighed, and reverted to a subject area that was, if not entirely comfortable, at least familiar. "It took months to get this meeting on the books; it's going to be a hassle to reschedule. How much attention did we get, anyway?" she asked.  

He squinted at her incredulously. "Right now, in this condition, you're worried about missing the meeting, and _press_?"

"Yes," echoing her earlier response. "Witnesses? Reporters?"

"Okay, fine. There were a few people who saw the crash, and a few more who stuck around long enough to see you getting pulled out of the car and me telling everyone who looked important that you were pregnant and allergic to _fraises_... which in hindsight probably made me look like a complete lunatic, unless the standards of French trauma care include _crêpes aux fruits_. I also might have gotten slightly agitated when I was physically barred from following you into the ER."

She closed her eyes in exasperation. "Please tell me you didn't threaten anyone."

He cleared his throat. "I may have made a statement to the effect that I would beat the shit out of anyone who tried to keep me from you. However, I believe it was clear that there was no actual intent of harm." Spoken like someone with years of experience on press conference damage control. "Then again, I said that one in English so who knows who got what." 

"Ugh, Tony, we had been doing such a good job of keeping the situation under wraps. I'm sure the whole world knows that I was pregnant now."

" 'The situation?' How are you so... so... _professional_ about this? You get that the baby is gone, right?"

Pepper shrugged. "Yes, and I never know if you're going to make it home. I try not to be overly attached to life." Tony's hold on her hand slackened and his shoulders sagged; he looked like she'd just slapped him in the face. "I'm sorry, that was a horrible thing to say." 

She didn't actually feel that bad.

~ ~ ~ ~ 

When Pepper was discharged from the hospital, she wanted nothing more than to go back to the States and get back to work, but Tony insisted that she follow the doctor's recommendation of not traveling _par avion_ for at least a few more days due to her concussion. Nowhere in Europe sounded at all appealing to her, however. She wasn't keen on staying in France or anywhere else French-speaking; Tony had been away in London when she learned she was pregnant, and she didn't really want to dig up those emotions. And, even though they'd been to Venice under happier circumstances since "the palladium thing," as they called it, Italy still had baggage in her mind, too. Switzerland sounded, well, neutral. She wouldn't hear Tony's suggestion of acquiring some kind of reinforced car, so they made their way there by train--a train that was eerily empty, leaving Pepper to wonder just how many extra seats Tony had purchased for privacy.

The countryside was beautiful, and their villa was nice, but the stay was awkward at best. She slept a lot, not because she was necessarily that tired, but mostly to pass the time without having to be aware of Tony watching her like a stack of fine china teetering on the edge of a shelf. It also made it easier to act like she didn't know how much liquor he was drinking. Most mornings she found him passed out on a couch with a rocks glass and an empty bottle within reach, which would be gone next time she emerged from the bedroom. That was something she hadn't needed to worry about for years, and she wasn't particularly interested in dealing with it now--especially since he'd apparently learned to clean up his own messes in the morning.

Tony was having an overtly harder time with the loss of the baby and her other injuries than she was, but she deflected the few times he'd tried to talk about it, despite knowing full well how hard it would be for Tony to work up the nerve. She still didn't feel bad for blowing him off. He had completely irrational guilt, and she was not interested in participating in it. She had some physical injuries that were healing normally and she was doing fine. Above all, she was a pragmatist, and having a baby really was about the least practical decision possible, given the circumstances of their lives. She decided that things ending before they really started was probably for the best, anyway.

Pepper was glad when it was finally time to head home, thinking that they might just fall back into something normal. She had planned to sleep the entire flight back to the States, but Tony kept making her move around for fear of blood clots in her casted leg. She wasn't sure if she was relieved or annoyed when she realized that he had stopped drinking long enough to be sober when they landed, so he could drive them home himself. At least she already knew how to deal with Tony's pity; Happy potentially could have broken up some of the tension but ultimately would have been an unknown variable, and was probably harboring his own irrational guilt about being the one driving when they crashed.   

When they got home, Tony insisted on carrying her straight to bed. "Tony, you don't have to baby me--" he looked pained at the choice of expression. "I get around fine with the crutch."

"Just let me." Once she got into bed, he sat down next to her, handed her a glass of water and some pain meds, and told her that he needed to return some phone calls; he seemed to be talking to the headboard.

"Dammit, Tony. Stop walking on eggshells around me. I. Am. Fine. I'm fine. Why can't you just get over this so we can get back to work and our lives can go back to normal? Like, me being the one taking care of you and _your_ company, as opposed to you treating me like a porcelain doll. This is not normal, except maybe the part where you drink enough to double Scotland's GDP." 

"Well as long as we're on the subject of old habits, how about you acting like the only thing that really matters is the damned _company_? We were gonna be a family, but suddenly we're not, and you almost died too, and you keep pretending that none of that is important."

"You don't get to tell me how to feel about thi--"

"I'm not trying to tell you how to feel," Tony said across her. "I just wish you would feel _something_. Anger, sadness--I don't know, relief? I don't have a clue what's going on in your head. Scotch has been the more emotionally fulfilling companion lately."

For the first time ever, Pepper slapped him across the face. She wondered briefly how many people would believe that it had actually never happened before, and then snaked her hand behind his head and kissed him--hard. He was caught off guard, but started to pull away after a few brief seconds.

"Pepper..."

"On top of everything else, we're seriously still not having sex? You're even more insufferable sober."

They stared each other down for a moment, each challenging the other to push farther, then Tony's eyes softened and he shook his head. "Awful shit happened that was out of our control, and we're both pretty bad at not getting our way. But the sooner we start dealing with this together--as in, actually together, not practicing inappropriate avoidance behaviors while we happen to be in the same room and generally acting like assholes in each others' general direction..." He paused for a moment as his thoughts trailed off, and he shook his head slightly again. "We can do better... right?" He reached out to brush some hair behind her ear with a hesitancy that broke her heart. Pepper closed her eyes and leaned into his touch, silently cursing him for suddenly being the grown-up she had wished for for so many years. She struggled to keep her control as a choked sob escaped.

Tony pulled her into his chest and spoke into her hair. "I'm so sorry I couldn't protect you from... everything."

She stopped herself from saying "It's okay," and settled on "I know," instead. She grabbed a fistful of his shirt and let go of the emotions she didn't know she had been damming. It was as simultaneously cathartic and horrible as the last time she remembered crying herself to sleep--but at least this time Tony was with her and not in a cave.

They woke the next morning still tangled in an awkward embrace. They finally really _talked_ , about how they felt after a pregnancy ended shy of halfway--from a random, violent accident that could have claimed her life too--and how much they should mourn for the potential person they would never meet. They talked about keeping liquor out of the house for a while. They talked about how to deal with the press. They talked about whether or not they should try again; even though they hadn't been trying to get pregnant in the first place, it turned out they'd both gotten kind of attached to the idea. Overall, they came to very few conclusions. But, over the following weeks and months, Pepper lost her sling and cast and cuts and bruises, without losing Tony or herself too. There were some mis-steps, but they moved forward, together--they worked a lot better that way.

~ ~ ~ ~ 


	3. Epilogue

~ ~ ~ ~

"JARVIS?"

"Yes, Miss Potts?"

"Could you ask Tony to come up here? Make sure to tell him I'm okay."

"Of course."

She could have just hopped off the bathroom counter--the same one she'd found herself sitting on nearly a year before--and gone down to the lab herself, but as she stared at the test in her hand she wasn't entirely certain that her knees weren't wobbly. An impossibly brief amount of time later, she heard Tony coming through the bedroom. "Pepper? Are you okay?" he asked as he came rounding in the bathroom door, having clearly not paid attention to the message she'd asked JARVIS to relay.

  "I'm great." She saw his eyebrows furrow in question at her position in the room. "Come here." As he stepped over to her, she handed him the plastic stick with a perfectly formed little plus-sign in its window.  

Realization dawned on his face. "Seriously?"   

Pepper bit back a smile and nodded, and he kissed her full on the mouth. When she wrapped her arms around his neck, he picked her up off the counter by the waist and spun them halfway around, earning a surprised squeak from her; even if he claimed otherwise, sometimes even Tony Stark liked to do things that were a little cliché. When their lips separated, they stood forehead-to-forehead for a few quiet moments until Tony quirked one side of his mouth. "You know, no one in the world except you can get away with handing me things, and now we know that includes stuff you've _peed_ on. This is clearly true love, Potts."

She gave him a look that was equal parts endearment and annoyance. "Shut up and kiss me agai--"

His lips were on hers before she could finish the sentence. She hoped for the best, and prepared for the worst, but thought, _"We'll be okay this time, no matter what."_

~ ~ ~ ~

**Author's Note:**

> Miscarriage is one of those things that different people react to in very different ways. My goal with this fic was not to imply that there's a 'right' way to handle it, nor that having another baby necessarily Makes It All Better. But the idea of characters with lives as atypical and personalities as strong as Tony and Pepper dealing with an issue this real, caused by something as relatively mundane as an auto accident, was something that crawled into my brain and wouldn't leave until I hashed it out. In my view, that involved both of them burying themselves in something more familiar--Pepper in work, and Tony in drink--and being more than a little bit afraid of their emotions (and each other). Let me know if it worked.


End file.
